Differing geo-political dimensions in North Africa

Analysts have been monitoring carefully how North African countries are grappling with what to do next while war between Iran and Israel rages on with some more affected by the clashes than others.
In an interesting analysis Alissa Pavia has drawn attention to how Israel-Iran War has squeezed Egypt's energy imports. Egypt is one country with interests at stake. The North African state is already experiencing power shortages as Israel has halted its natural gas flows. Since June 13, Israel's Leviathan and Karish's gas fields have been shut down, which has been providing up to 20 per cent of Egypt's gas consumption. This has forced Cairo to seek out alternatives, with President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi's government promising to avoid a repeat of last year's blackouts that caused massive disruptions across the country.
In this context on June 13, just a few hours after the outbreak of hostilities, Egypt's Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources Kareem Badawi unveiled a plan to tap into low-quality fuels like diesel and mazut to fill in the gap.
Once a net exporter of LNG, Egypt is now apparently unable to provide enough electricity for its growing population. Egypt now has to depend on gas to power up to 90 per cent of its electricity This has become slightly difficult as it only produces about 5.7 billion cubic feet, falling short of its consumption needs.
Consequently, with a population at 114.5 million, and global temperatures rising by 0.53 degrees per decade, summers have become increasingly difficult for Egyptians, with daily power cuts across the country an increasingly common occurrence.
In a recent report published by Reuters it has been revealed that the Egyptian economy grew by 4.77 per cent in the third quarter of its 2024/25 fiscal year, up from 2.2 per cent in the same quarter a year earlier, as manufacturing activity has recovered according to their Planning Ministry. It may be noted that their fiscal year runs from July to June. Manufacturing activity grew by 16.3 per cent in the third quarter, recovering from a 3.9 per cent decline in the same quarter of the previous year. However, oil and natural gas extraction has continued to decline, contracting by 10.38 per cent. The planning ministry also provided fourth-quarter revenue figures for the Suez Canal, showing a decline to US Dollar 900 million from US Dollar 1.1 billion a year earlier. For the third quarter, activity fell by 23.1 per cent compared with a drop of 51.6 per cent the prior year, it said, without giving exact figures.
Since the war between Gaza and Israel broke out in 2023, the situation has markedly worsened for Egypt given its reliance on Israeli gas imports. Sustained blackouts, especially during the sweltering summers when consumer usage rises, have disrupted local business and people's everyday lives, impacting an already frail economy that nearly defaulted before the International Monetary Fund agreed to expand its loan in March 2024. While Israel has resumed small quantities of exports from the Tamar field, they are not enough to provide relief, forcing Egypt to look elsewhere amid growing fears of becoming overly reliant on Israeli gas exports.
This scenario has led Cairo to seek relief in some unlikely places.
Consistent with this scenario, Egypt has been holding talks with Qatar, one of the world's top producers of natural gas. The energy talks started in May 2025 when Minister Kareem Badawi met with his counterpart in Doha to discuss the potential for joint natural gas projects. Ongoing discussions involved exploratory and investment activities, as well as the possibility of enhancing Egypt's corporate presence in the Qatari market.
However, one needs to remember that ties between Qatar and Egypt have historically been marked by geopolitical tensions. In 2017, Egypt joined a host of other Middle East states in blockading Qatar on allegations that it was funding terrorism.
The respective regimes also inhabit opposite sides of the ideological spectrum, with Qatar's political landscape dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, and Egypt's military-backed government fiercely opposed to it. However, this bilateral flare-up appears to have ended in 2021, when Egypt joined GCC countries in signing the Al Ula Declaration, ending the four-year blockade and restoring diplomatic ties.
Karim Mezran, Director of North Africa at the Atlantic Council, has observed that Qatar still hosts some members of the Muslim Brotherhood but in much reduced numbers. This recalibration should pave the way for smoother relations with Egypt going forward. However, it has also been observed that whether the Egypt-Qatar rapprochement can hold and be fruitful remains to be seen, though there is cause for optimism.
Meanwhile, preoccupied with their own domestic crises, Tunisia and Libya are expecting to remain largely protected from the immediate effects of the conflict between Iran and Israel. Relations between Tunisia and Iran remain limited, with little binding them ideologically beyond a shared anti-Western stance. Despite reports of the two countries growing closer, trade and economic relations has remained negligible, while security cooperation remains nonexistent.
Likewise, Libya is likely to be only marginally affected, given its lack of relations with Israel and its negligible ties with Iran. Aside from a diplomatic breakthrough between Libya and Israel in 2023 when secret meetings between the two countries' Foreign Ministers were leaked, the two States have no diplomatic ties. Iran, for its part, while eyeing Libya with interest for several decades, has never involved itself directly in the conflict. Consequently, neither Tripoli's Government of National Unity nor Tobruk's House of Representative have benefitted from Iranian closeness and will therefore unlikely be impacted by the outcomes of the war.
On the other hand, Morocco and Algeria could find their regional positions strengthened or weakened depending on how the conflict unfolds. Both countries vie for influence over the contested Western Sahara region, with Morocco claiming it as part of its sovereign territory and Algeria backing the Polisario Front which seeks independence. Recently, rumors have also spun of potential Iranian infiltration of the Front (although the Front vehemently denies these allegations) as part of its efforts to cultivate influence among regional proxy groups. If true, Morocco, which signed the Abraham Accords in 2020 formally siding with Western powers in the Middle Eastern theater, will eye with pleasure the potential downfall of the current Iranian regime. Algeria, by contrast, would view such developments with far less enthusiasm.
It would also be pertinent to refer to how Algeria-United States ties have grown amid Western Sahara tensions.
Algeria is taking strategic steps to expand its energy partnership with the United States as tensions over the Western Sahara dispute continue to mount. This renewed engagement comes as part of Algeria's broader push to assert economic diplomacy in the face of growing international pressure surrounding the long-standing territorial issue. On June 24, the Secretary-General of Algeria's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lounes Magramane, met with U.S. Ambassador Elizabeth Moore Aubin to discuss regional developments and bilateral cooperation. Both parties reaffirmed their commitment to strengthening ties, with Ambassador Aubin later emphasising the importance of this dialogue through her social media platforms.
As U.S. interest in the Western Sahara issue intensifies, reports indicate that Washington may be looking to revive stalled negotiations ahead of a key UN Security Council session scheduled for October. The Trump Administration might apparently support Morocco's 2007 autonomy proposal, prompting Algeria to step up its own diplomatic efforts. In a parallel move on the economic front, Algeria has opened its doors wider to American energy investors.
President Abdelmadjid Tebboune recently held back-to-back meetings with top executives from Chevron and ExxonMobil. Energy Minister Mohamed Arkab and Sonatrach CEO Rachid Hachichi were also present, signaling a unified and high-level push for foreign partnership. Central to Algeria's new approach is a proposed energy law that would allow foreign companies to hold up to 80 per cent ownership in new oil and gas ventures marking a major shift from previous investment rules. Minister Arkab has described the legislation as a transformative step, aimed at modernising the sector while maintaining national resource control. Earlier this year, Algeria's Ambassador to the U.S., Sabri Boukadoum, also expressed the country's openness to negotiating broad resource-based agreements with Washington, stating that "the sky's the limit."
Nevertheless, one needs to remember that as efforts to reignite UN-led talks on Western Sahara remain uncertain, Algeria's energy overtures could serve both as an economic opportunity and a calculated diplomatic response.

Muhammad Zamir is a former Ambassador is an analyst specialised in foreign affairs, right to information and good governance.
muhammadzamir0@gmail.com